Pond Boss Forums FISH & FISHING Sunfish-Including Largemouth and Smallmouth Bass Pellet training RES

Nice Shorty!

Those RES look excellent! Brutes!

Update on the pellet training. After I pulled the lid last time I added the remaining bottom third RES I still had out in my shop, about 3 dozen smaller fish. Last night I pulled the lid again and let most of them go into the pond. Here are some pictures.

Good work on getting RES pellet trained and to sizes up to 6.5".

Good job! And there are people who still say it can't be done. Of course I have an old text that says largemouth bass can't be feed trained either. LOL

I'm guessing I had 40 RES over 5" and at least twelve of them that were 6" to 6-1/2" in size. All of them hatched in 2012.

Seems to me that they have grown 1/2-3/4" in less than a month. Man are those some hefty ones! Very nice job. Bruce has some serious competition.

Bruce got a late start pellet training RES this summer but rumor has it that he is on his way to catching up.

Rumors started by some guy with the initials of BC and it ain't Bill Cody.

All the cool guys working with fish have a 'B' and a 'C' in their initials.

Except some are backwards. Which ones?

Backwards, forwards, upside down, inside out, whatever.

Backwards, forwards, upside down, inside out, whatever.

That got me tryin to think but my clacker swings pretty slowly and just now did it ring my bell. It ain't what you said Cecil but rather "over under sideways down" Recorded by the Yardbirds who later morphed into Led Zepplin.

I have five RES left that I moved indoors to a 75 gallon aquarium, they are now 7"+ and are FHM eating machines when the lights go out night.

Fascinating thread.

I know little about aquaculture or raising fish although I have spent literally hundreds of hours under the water over many years as a scuba diver observing fish behavior (mostly saltwater although a little freshwater). Mass spawning of gray Chromis is cool to watch. My wife is a macro photographer so that means I move slow in the water to not leave her behind and that means observing a lot of fish behavior that many divers that swim all the time miss. I hope my pond will clear up enough to get some underwater photos of my fish (no chance of getting wife in pond water after diving in the ocean for years).

Am learning bits and pieces as I pick this stuff up reading what you guys post. Redear seem like an interesting fish to me and I am wanting to get more in my pond. There were a few mixed in with the bluegill when stocked this spring but not as many as I would have liked. I was hoping to get some more this fall put in before the LMB get big enough to make them a snack. Not too sure if I am too late as I put the LMB in a couple months ago. When inquiring about getting RES they said call back first of November and we are almost there.

The fish cages and raising fish indoors is all a mystery to me but am picking up what I can. Maybe will give something a try next spring. Bought a seine the other day but have not tried to use it. Would like to see what is out in the pond. Maybe snag a grandson to help soon.

Anyway, thanks for all the good discussion and keep it up.

Have been feeding both sinking and floating pellets so hope some of my RES are getting their share off the bottom. About time to quit from what I have learned on PBF as my water temp is getting down close to 55.

snrub.

Wallace Fish Farms brought me 250 2-3" RES about a week ago. Put half of them in the old renovated pond and half to supplement the small population that were stocked this spring in the new pond.

I kept 4 of the smallest ones back and put them in an aquarium here in the house. First few days was pretty hard to get them to eat anything but they would take a little crushed up dry shrimp. Now they are voracious little things coming out of the structure I provided and looking at me to be fed. They are readily and competitively going after crushed up floating catfish feed (that sinks after it is crushed into small pieces with pliers).

Also put about 50 snails in with them out of the pond. Some are too large for them to eat but they have decimated the tiny ones and are working their way up in snail size. Need to collect some more for them and put in there.

Only have one that is kind of timid and only eating enough to sustain itself. The other three are go getters but only one will hit stuff on the surface occasionally. The other three will only hit stuff mid water or near the bottom. They seem to much prefer to hit something moving and aggressively get the crushed feed as it is sinking. Once it hits the bottom they loose interest but I noticed that later they will stare at something on the bottom for a while then pick it up. Sometimes a snail, sometimes a piece of the feed.

Had company last week, one of which was an eleven year old boy so thought it might be fun for him to trap some additional small fish out of the pond and put in the aquarium to watch along with the RES. Water is cold so not a lot went into the minnow trap but ended up with 4 very small BG ranging from one and a quarter inch to about an inch and a half. I was a little worried the RES would badger or eat the small BG but so far everything copacetic. The most aggressive RES once in a while will chase the smallest BG just a little like the smaller fish might be a meal but so far all 8 fish are still alive and doing well.

The RES are interesting to watch. More so than the BG. They definitely prefer subdued light as opposed to bright light. I leave the aquarium light off most of the time because with it on the RES spend time in the shadows of the structure (concrete cap block with three holes - they like sitting inside the holes when the light is on).

It appears to me they will abruptly swim to a spot on the bottom, stop and remain motionless except for fin movement to keep them in place in the current, and stare at something to see if there is movement. If it moves (as in a snail) they make a quick strike and pick it up, crunching it around in their mouth either till they spit it back out or end up crunching it up enough to eat it.

Interesting fish. I like them.

Thanks for the update and info. Let us know how it works. RES will eat any snail/crust/worm/invert etc. Also pellets.

I made a small feed ring for my aquarium RES, I placed it at the dark end of the tank where I have the light shut off. They are eating a few AM 500 floating pellets and an occasional cricket off the surface out of the feed ring.

I have used a piece of tin suspended about 10 inches from the pond bottom to feed RES over . The pellets float then sink landing on the tin. RES hide under the tin and come out to feed on pellets landing on the tin.

ewest, what depth of water is your tin setup in?

Do you have PVC ring above it to keep wind from floating the pellets off target?

Why not just feed sinking pellets? Maybe so some of the RES will start taking the surface pellets before they sink? In other words, for training them?

The small RES in my aquarium seem to like to catch stuff moving on the way down.

It is in a protected cove and was used behind a blocking net. Area about 2000 sq feet and water is from 0 to 5 feet. Tin is about 6 ft sq with edges bent up about 3 inches. No ring needed but would be a good idea if subject to wind influence. Feeder throws on top of tin. I have used sinking pellets there as well (winter). Floating used most as there are small BG being fed also. Have even mixed both types of pellets in the feeder during fall (decreasing water temps).

Thanks ewest. That makes sense. The RES do seem to like to hide out of the light.

Keep in mind my observations are from a person that has almost no experience with aquaculture or fresh water fish. That said, sometimes new eyes see things others may have missed. With that in mind I will give an observation that I noticed tonight.

Before I started getting interested in RES. BG. LMB and FHM my wife did most of the work with whatever aquarium fish we have had over the years. Mostly goldfish with the occasional batch of wild fish we would keep over the summer when our kids were small for them to observe. So not a lot of experience with observing fresh water fish or taking care of them in captivity.

MY RES have been eating well. They always seemed hungry and would take crushed up floating pellets. Problem is they only seemed interested in what was moving and what they caught while it was sinking. There was feed noticeably accumulating on the bottom. They went off feed and I suspected the water quality had become poor because of the excess feed in the tank.

Wife suggested we suck up the feed off the bottom with a mesh over the shop vac hose. Said it works slick and what she uses in her inside and outside goldfish pond/containers. Ok. Let's give it a try. Like I said, she has attended to all this stuff in the past and me with little experience. Important safety tip. When a newbie (me) is helping for the first time, be sure the hose to the vac is installed in the correct "sucking" inlet and NOT the "blowing outlet. When she said "turn it on" bad things happened.

An hour later the fish aquarium was completely cleaned, moved to an area of the house that does not have carpet on the floor, and I am sure what must have been temporarily traumatized RES and BG seemed happy and were swimming about. Their appetite came back today.

During the somewhat tense move of the aquarium we decided to relocate an odd FHM that a few months before had ended up in her inside goldfish pot. The RES (3") and even the very small BG (1 1/4 - 2") did not seem to eat much off the bottom. My previous experience with FHM in the aquarium and my observations of them in the pond told me they were not particular where the feed was located. Maybe the one medium size FHM would help keep the bottom clean. We put the single FHM in with the RES and BG.

Finally the observation. I'm getting there. Fed the fish early morning. They were hungry. Like usual the RES ate well the feed that was dropping while ignoring what rested on the bottom. The BG also ate good on the dropping feed and the largest one also picked a little on the bottom. But the FHM, not being so particular, ate anything in sight. In doing so he would often pick up a piece to big to consume. Biting off a chunk or spitting it out, one of the RES then seen the feed "move" and took it.

So I am thinking, maybe I need to put some more FHM in with the RES as "trainer fish". I had also noticed before that if the fin action of one RES caused a feed morsel to move another RES would often see it and take the previously ignored feed. As you said your RES ate off the tin, I knew it was only a matter of training to get my RES to eat stationary feed off the bottom of the aquarium. Maybe FHM will aid in that training?

I need to see if I can catch a few more out of the pond, put them in with the other (lonely) FHMN, and see if it helps. Maybe if noting else, it will keep the feed cleaned up off the bottom so it does not foul the water.

Any one else have other suggestions for training? With only four RES in the aquarium (with most in the ponds) this is merely a learning/observation situation for me. Not of any real significance concerning my pond. But never know, I might have a need to train some more for some reason in the future.

Sorry for the long rant for a rather simple observation.

snrub

snub, I can support your observation of fish using fin movement. I have only watched CC and noticed a couple times of this. When building a prototype FISharvester I used sheet metal for the floor. CC would swim around outside and make splashes with tails that would knock the feed out of the feeder. When I used floating feed they could also use this same method. I have fixed this by using only sinking pellets and found a PVC panel that is ribbed and has texture to it. Once they realize they can't control the feed they become conditioned to going in and getting the feed. Sometimes it's hard to believe that I'm dealing with dumb animals.

So I have heard RES are hard to catch.

Is it that they are usually just lower numbers than the BG, or is it really harder to get them to take a hook?

I realize they tend to live and spawn at deeper depths. Would you fish for them more like CC but with different bait? Or does the CC get the bait before the RES gets there so that is why they are harder to catch?

What about in a pond that had the main fish as RES? Still going to be hard to catch?

In our refurbished pond I put 10 5" BG late last summer 2013 (I imagine they could have gotten one late spawn off, but maybe not) and then 125 3" RES a couple months later. An acre or a little less pond size. Had put FHM in earlier in the spring. Have not put any predators in but probably will this next spring (2014) or early summer.

Or maybe I should hold off another year with the predators (2015) since I placed such a small number of forage fish???? Did not really have solid plans for this pond, which is probably a mistake.